Mind/Body

Before I begin, in my Augustine paper that I gave an argument against free will of the Augustinian conception similar to the one made here a few weeks ago. I got a comment back and feel like I should make a clarifying statement: It is not merely God's foreknowledge of our actions that eliminates free will (again, in the Augustinian conception); instead, it is that God presumably knows every possible change and the effects it would carry over into that person. In this way, I have no more free will than a pool ball when hit by a cue or a Rube Goldberg machine. My choices were predetermined before I first acted.

Ok, onward to new content! We didn't cover this in class at all (unfortunately) but part of our assigned reading dealt with the Mind/Body problem, which everyone taking Modern next semester is going to see come up again right off the bat.

Aquinas' position is (unsurprisingly) dualistic: The soul is immaterial, yet substance, acts as the understanding part of the body, and requires the body so that it may carry out it's task of understanding.

Bleh, that's the uninteresting part.

Things that interest me:

He posits that universals exist (abstract universals, or so it seems in Q76:ReObj3), but the knowledge of universals is impeded by the senses, since the senses are material but universals are abstract. This is an interesting point because in q75, Aquinas argues that the soul cannot know material things if it is itself a material thing. Yet, in q76, the soul can know universals, which are (as Aristotle posited) immaterial fact abstracted from material. Apparently the soul can only learn the material through abstracting it to an immaterial level.

Aristotle never answers the question Descartes later tries, that is how does the immaterial soul influence the material body? What is the point of connection? I know it seems basic, most of us grew up with the notion of God, as immaterial(ish?) influencing the physical world, but how? What is the connection point?

Sadly our little printout ends just before Aquinas declares himself for rationalism or empiricism. I think I'm gonna need to go read the rest of that question.

On Systematizing

We like systems, they're convenient easy standards to which we can compare the world. Then, when we find points at which they do not work, we use those points as reasons to disregard to discard those systems. The problem is that no system can universally stand at all points of argument, so no system can withstand our onslaught if we wish to cast it off upon the slightest inconsistency. Yet, this is what is done in Western Philosophy, and I'm guilty of doing it myself (see my complain of Augustine's contradiction between his comments on Time and his comments on Free Will). I say this has been a problem within Western Philosophy but there have been some steps taken to move beyond this need for universalized/systematized understanding.

I'll point to a few, but first let me explain why this is a problem (beyond what was stated earlier). Let's start with Plato, in our insistance in taking the entirety of the Platonic Corpus as one system, we fail to take into account the natural growth of ideas. Philosophers, in some way, are concerned with being right (yes yes, I know there are plenty of points to disagree with here, but let's not get bogged down in the minutiae and miss the point). Let me personalize this and start using me as an example (and yeah, I guess I imply that I think I'm a philosopher, on whatever level). I think I'm right in a lot of things, but understand that I am not always right. If I come across a point that requires refinement of my thought, or perhaps complete negation and contradiction, then I will (usually) accept those given that the counterpoint comes with sufficient evidence.

I change. I can look back at the things I've said over the years and note the differences, and I'm ok with both the fact that I have changed and that I once thought such things. It's natural progression.

So why is it that I look at Plato and say "Dammit man, you can't throw a concept like the Good in because it causes issues with what you've established previously"? I think somewhere along the lines it was said "You didn't say that you were changing your system, so it's not an acceptable change," but, it's kind of difficult to simply state that you're changing your system when you're expressing philosophy via a dialogue. So we can point out the flaw of regress within the system, and sit in our haughty comfort without doing Plato justice.

So, is it fair to take the Socratic statements of Rationalism in the early dialogues and interpret the latter dialogues in the same context of the same rationalism? Or should the latter dialogues be taken for what they are, a change in thought (not just subject). We accept the change of thought in Wittgenstein as such (and he even went so far as to call Philosophy a disease!), we accept Schelling for what he is, why must we systematize anyone that doesn't either directly state they are changing, or make change so apparent that we understand a new train of thought has begun?

Mostly, because we (again) want our systems. But, apologies to Ockham, having one system to explain it all may be more elegant than having multiples, the single system doesn't work. It breaks down. So, perhaps we need to accept a bit of contradiction, I accept X in Y situation and A in B situation, even though X and A may contradict each other. Or am I becoming to Eastern?

On how to ruin interesting philosophy

God is a thought who makes crooked all that is straight.

-Nietzsche

Augustine, oh Augustine.

You start off with such an interesting topic, "time."

Seriously, I'm interested, time is just not that talked about, kind of like Solipsism. It's one of those interesting concepts to sit and think through, but the answer your come up with isn't going to alter your life; if you don't believe time exists, you're either going to continue living life as you did before or you go spend some time in a room with padded walls (this also applies to Solipsism and pluralism). Yet these questions may offer some epistemological benefit, for any serious inquiry on these lines must begin with "I" and "Experience," (thus advocating empiricism as base and primary) and reason outward from that point (thus advocating rationalism as secondary, but still essential).

It ends up as interesting philosophy. Of course one must contextualize the philosopher doing the questioning, Augustine in this wasn't familiar with modern scientific theory and the concept of non-linear time (as in moment to moment progression, not the historical "time is circular" argument, which Augustine would have been well versed in). The problem isn't the pre-modernity evidenced in Augustine, instead the problem is the same encountered in Aquinas, Descartes, and plenty of others throughout the years.

God got in the way of interesting philosophy.

I'm not saying god doesn't exist, nor that the question of god is not philosophically interesting in itself, instead I'm saying that creating philosophical systems predicated on the belief in god as base causes problems. Or rather, not even the belief in god, but the belief in specific attributes about god. Descartes, for instance, started of so nicely with "I know that I exist," but went horribly awry when he started building a system around the idea of a good or perfect god.

A first cause? Sure. An intelligent first cause? If you must. A perfect creator? Why? Was it necessary?

But before Descartes was talking about the goodness of god, Augustine was talking about the "omni"s of god (omnipresence, omniscience, omnipotence, etc). For god to be god for Augustine, he needed to exist outside of time.

He couldn't precede time, for that would imply a regress of time to which the earlier form of time god was subject, but Augustine doesn't actually adress this point, instead time started when god created. Time, for Augustine, is still infinite, but began when god created it. Meh, ok, I can deal with that.

God's relationship to time is where Augustine starts to lose himself. As the creator of time, god exists in full knowledge and experience of every point of eternity at once (which implies gods omniscience and omnipresence, the former Augustine touches on without directly naming in book XI, the latter Augustine doesn't address in this text). This eternal-experience-at-once-ness of god is interesting in light of god as creator. If god is experiencing/knowing every moment of eternity at once, then god knows every ramification of every trait placed into a creation.

Every action committed by every-everything is known at the point of creation. Which brings up the interesting question, "Does god know what ramifications specific changes to creation will have?" If no, the god is not omnipotent or omniscient. If yes, this implies a multiplicity of timelines. Further, this sets up a deterministic system, as every outcome is determined a priori.

But the point I'm most interested in is the conflict of Confessions Book XI with the text the publishers decided to offer right after it, a dialogue on free will. In the dialogue Augustine says God gives us free will and judges our eternal resting place on the actions we commit.

Wait, what?

God knew exactly what I was going to do from the first point of creation (since he experiences every point from eternity to eternity simultaneously), knew what certain changes to my psyche may have done* (or else he is not omniscient), and still punishes those that don't act according to his wishes?

God cannot be creator, all knowing, and judge and there be a system in which any entity other than god has free will.**

Moral of the story: Don't let god ruin interesting philosophy. Don't force a train or reasonable thought down some path to prove a point, instead let it go where it will.

*say the impulse to question everything were removed, I'd probably be a happy pew sitter

**Actually, this brings up a new paradox! If we define free will as the ability to do what one desires (and of course, the definition of free will falls into contention throughout philosophy), then can god create a system in which god is still creator, all knowing, and judge where there is free will of the created?

In which I strive to be helpful, but probably fail

The beginning section of Aristotle's Metaphysics talks about the Philosopher as the one who has the most pure knowledge, since he is learning of the thing for the sake of learning itself, not for some material benefit. This question of, "Why Philosophy?" is picked up throughout history, folks like William James talk about Philosophers as (kind of) guides in decision making, Bertrand Russell echoes Aristotle, saying Philosophy should be studied for the "sake of the questions themselves," and Dewey points to the philosopher as the instrument in which we learn to think critically of all things. Perhaps my favorite statement, however, is Nietzsche's "What I understand by 'philosopher': A terrible explosive in the presence of which everything is in danger."

The danger comes from the constant desire to understand, search, and critique; all of which work together to make the philosopher, as Aristotle points out, the best teacher. While I'm certainly no supreme philosopher, I do think the ability to teach is a good indication of ones comprehension of the material. So, with that starting point, allow me to try to help.

I read through all the recent blog posts this weekend (yeah, I do that because I actually like this stuff), and there seems to be a large amount of confusion on the principles of substance, both primary and secondary. Whether this results from the somewhat confusing terminology provided by Aristotle and discussed in class, or if it's the constant questions of that one kid that sits in the middle of the class that are tangential and probably not beneficial to the class, either way, confusions exists.

So for that, let me try to help (and again, my understanding has been proven wrong before, so don't take me as the end all, by any means).

Primary substance is the starting point, in Aristotle's conception. But what is it, exactly? It, according to the theme we've picked up on in class, is that which contains the essential characteristics that generally make up a thing. Confusing terminology, to be sure, but lets use an example to help sort it out. Primary substance will always be a particular thing, you, me, that girl over there, etc. Let's work with Socrates, since Aristotle does. The essential characteristics of Socrates are (as pointed out by Erin Echols, here) 1. The Ability to Reason and 2. The nutritive element (what we call the body).

It should be noted, here, that these essential characteristics are not solely physical. Second, it should be noted that they may not exist in every case, as we discussed in class 10-20. A mentally handicapped person may not be able to reason, but they are still human.

The way in which one defines what the essential characteristics are is secondary substance. This is, I think, where the vast amount of confusion hits our class. Secondary substance is derived by looking at primary substances and grouping them together, we refer to such groupings as Species. In the case of our example, Socrates is grouped into the Species "(Hu)Man." When we have grouped these primary substances together, we can look at them and determine what their commonalities and differences are. We then use these to define them, saying (something like) "See, all (or perhaps almost all) of these (hu)mans possess the ability to reason and physical bodies, this should be our definition."

The problem, here, is that the system is circular. To define primaries one needs secondaries, but to build secondaries one needs to group primaries.

One final word about characteristics.

The non-essential characteristics, those such as "tall, short, hot, cold, brown" etc, are not defined on the secondary level, instead they exist on the primary level. It is because they exist that essentials must be defined on the secondary level, since we cannot ever fully ascertain all of the non-essential characteristics of any particular, and it would be wrong to say that the just because a characteristic is displayed in one particular, it should be displayed in every particular of that species.

Maybe this helped, maybe not.

I may or may not have been around in the blogging world for a while, if you're interested in my (BS) philosophy (as well reading about an epic fall from theism into some screwed up agnostic that gets semi-defensive of Christianity) then you can read my old blog, here.

I do this for comparisons sake, if one sees how silly I was before, perhaps one shall view me as less silly now.

Aristotle and determinism

In Physics book II, Aristotle talks about Chance (and luck/fortune). Here, he gives us a glimpse down the rabbit hole of an argument that still clings soundly in the world today.

What role does chance play in the world?

According to Aristotle, it is merely the name that we give to an event where two effects of two causes came together. IE I’m walking under some trees and a pinecone hits me. One cause is that I’m walking under trees for my health, another is that the tree, at just the right moment (merely coincidental) severs its connection with the pinecone to procreate. Thus nothing happens by chance, ever, instead we see chance in coincidental, where two things happened for the sake other other things and came together.

The underlying argument is that everything happens for some purposed reason (the final cause, remember, is telos) and that, therefore, each thing follows some pre-determined path toward that end. This argument is one of the logical pillars for the concepts of Determinism, the idea that everything happens according to predetermined causes. Such an idea strikes against the concept of Free Will, and the proponents of such a concept will offer the immediate counter-attack “But I can change my system!”

Thus enters the murky waters.

Let’s say that I want to prove my free will by committing action X (the action itself doesn’t matter at all). Why are you so insistent on proving action X? It is because you are pre-determinately apprehensive about the loss of free will? Is that apprehension the cause of some further thing, which was caused by some other thing, and so on ad nauseum?

Still others will say, “I can will to do something or not do something!” But is this truly will? I leave with the question, “Does will require action?” and the statement that Aristotle seems to think action is quite important for something to be existent, so he’d probably say no.

Aristotle's Forms

I'm a bad student and I've only read Categories, and I know that Aristotle expands and alters his "forms" in latter texts, but I still see the basic outlines of the Aristotelian forms in "Categories." (subtle change to quotes because Blogger doesn't play nice with macs and clicking the italicize button is a lot of work). I previously mentioned that Aristotle gives more "value" to the particulars over the universals, or in fancy terms, Aristotle gives ontological priority* to the particulars while Plato gives ontological priority to the universals.

While, yes, from my understanding the "Formal Cause," as seen in Metaphysics, denotes that there is a "form" that exists outside of a particular, its existence is still dependent upon particulars. While some might not see the importance of this difference, this alteration in view (from Plato's top down to Aristotle's bottom up) completely changes the progression of thought. This focus on substance as the primary "stuff" causes universals to be viewed as the result of particulars. In the same way you couldn't have the species "human" without individual humans (that man, that woman, etc), things like beauty cannot exist without particulars onto which they can map themselves.

I may have a friend in this class that feels this change in perspective is not as important as I believe it to be**. Were such a friend to exist, s/he might say that "Aristotle's forms are interestingly enough very similar to Plato's forms," since both forms exist outside of any one particular. In one sense, s/he is right, they both exist outside of the particular, but in (almost) every other sense, s/he may be missing the mark. The importance concept here is that Plato's forms are that which cause everything, they have that (fancy phrase incoming!) ontological priority, they color everything that is said about anything. Aristotle's forms, however, are definitions*** (whats more, they are definitions constructed from grouping particulars to map out essential characteristics), they are, then, just explanations of what is already and not that which causes it to be.

*Wiki is your friend, but SEP is better. Ontological priority (in a quick and dirty explanation) is that which all other things come from. The thing with ontological priority can exist without all other things that do not have ontological priority.

**I think we aren't suppose to address each others views via blog posts. But he'll be ok.

***I know he says "causes" but his causes are more like answers to ontological questions (you did read those links I posted, right?)

Aristotelian Constructivism?

First off, a note on Aristotelian style: I took a logic class a year ago, it was lots of fun, I learned fun Latin words, how to create truth tables to assess validity, and (what I'm most thankful for now) how to make sense of Aristotle by equating his words into logical propositions. It's a semi-refreshing step away from the flowy* dialectic of Plato, since all the propositions are there in a nearly atomic format, and build upon each other nicely. (also, I like Aristotle because he disagree with Plato, and that's a beautiful thing)

Now, to the attempt at the "meat" of the blog...

Aristotle, in "Categories," promotes the idea that universals** are derived, and exist, only within particulars.*** If this is the case then universals are defined only by example through the items "named" after (or perhaps "of" is a better term) them. Thus my understanding of a TV is going to be colored by every TV I encounter, and each time I encounter and object that could fit within my understand of TV, I will name that object "TV" and it will further alter my conception of TV. This new, and each successive understanding of TV, is "true," and constantly changing.

So, unless, in some later text that I haven't read yet, Aristotle offers a different approach in understanding, I am going to posit that he has set the stage for a healthy constructivist theory of epistemology.

I like that.

*(ok it was only flowy at times)

**(you remember, those things that can be shared outside of themselves, like dogs and cats both being pets)

***(you're actually reading this one? ok, particulars would be "that dog" the one thing)

Parmenides and the defense of a position

I'll be honest, I find myself both thoroughly enjoying and thoroughly confused (At times) by Plato's "Parmenides" dialogue. I enjoy the dialogue in that I'm no Platonist and any criticism of the Forms makes me a bit over-giddy, but I'm often confused as to why Plato would include such an evisceration of his thought. I understand (from so many conversations with Dr. Rouse about the dialogue) that this is Plato's attempt to lay out the contemporaneous criticisms of the Forms, and work through some of them. This still doesn't resolve the issue satisfactorily.

It would be one thing to address the criticisms, defense in hand, and suss (to use the amazing British colloquialism) them properly. Instead, we're left with a bunch of loose ends, perhaps better termed a categorization of the critiques instead of an attempt to answer them. This brings to mind the question, "What is Plato shooting at, here?" Is he categorically listing these problems in hopes that a student will, at some point in time, come along and solve them properly? Has he finally reached a point where he's feeling backed into a corner and is, in some small way, acquiescing defeat? Or is there some other game going on, unknown to this lonely undergraduate?

If I were to place a wager, I'd say that Plato was laying out the problem in hopes that some future student could work through them. This guess does have some implicit issues, however, since Plato claimed knowledge of the Forms and that such knowledge was only the result of years of undertaking and actively working through, it's dubitable that Plato had the confidence in, essentially, anyone to reach this point. Without understanding the Forms, how could one be expected to defend them? (Which brings up the side point of the convenience in stating that the special knowledge of the Forms makes the knower sound crazy, a nice fallback point to those accused of insanity.)

Plato's greatest student, Aristotle, did indeed pick up the forms, but instead of relying on reason alone, Aristotle opens the door for empiricist understandings. Thus, while certain friends refer to themselves as Plato's Footnote, I'd be more comfortable as Aristotle's Footnote.

Plato. Catcher in the Rye. Harry Potter. Fahrenheit 451.

Stay with me. I'll connect the title, I promise.

As cliché as it may be, Catcher in the Rye is one of my favorite books. With a complete jackass of a protagonist that feels he's misunderstood by the world and uniquely understands the world better than any of his "phony" co-inhabitants, Salinger manages to create a character that almost everyone can connect with. Perhaps not everyone, but how many intellectuals will tell you that they've felt alienated, under-appreciated, and misunderstood by the world? Caulfield provides an exemplary character that goes through all of this pain (and mixes inordinate amounts of youthful angst to boot) and without learning how to fully deal with (it's hinted that he) ends up in a mental hospital. (Incredibly inarticulate and un-expansive) Moral? You've got to learn to live with the world.

Harry Potter is a book about wizards and witches. It's about love, dealing with power, forsaking power for the sacrifice and betterment of others. It's full of friendship, courage, and wisdom. The plot fights against sexism, racism, classism, and pushes equality. It shows exemplary characters that blow most religious texts' heroes entirely out of the water.

Fahrenheit 451 is a book about censorship. It's about protecting knowledge to the risk of one's own life. It's about how the ideals of society aren't always the best. It encourages individual thought, growth, introspection, and questioning.

All three of these are or have been banned books by different organizations.

Plato supports this idea of mass censorship for his intellectual elites. He assumes that the courage of the student will be inoculated with the discovery of death and the fear of the words of Homer and others of the malevolence and pain of Hades. Plato fears the weakening of Heroes shown as lamenting death, loss, or pain. Plato fears the very humanity of his philosopher kings becoming evident to themselves. The morals and thoughts presented in Catcher, Harry Potter, and Fahrenheit, would all be lost to his ideal kings. There very humanity thrown out in the creation of the naïve perfection education Plato advocates.

Instead the education should attempt to, as Plato later works into his allegory, revealing the full knowledge of the world. If these philosopher kings are truly capable of handling what is, then they should not have the thoughts of others hidden from them. Instead, with their superior capability for reason, they approach whatever ideas are given them, analyze, dissect and decide.

I find it humorous that this dialogue, presented with Socrates' own voice, is such an antithesis to his own approach.

Note: I should probably mention here that Banned Books Week happens at the end of this month.

Platonic Dualism and the Elevation of the Intellect

Our friend, Plato, believes in dualism, or the notion that there exists two different aspects of things, the material and the immaterial. The material consists of the body and all things within the realm of sensory experience, while the immaterial consists of things like the intellect and all things that are, as Plato terms it, invisible. It is the latter category that Plato says is superior and he bases the understanding of truth within the realm of the immaterial. The reason for his escalation of the immaterial is the fact that the senses are fallible, which makes them incompatible with truth.

The problem with the view that the intellect is superior to the senses because it is infallible is that, as anyone who has spent time conducting arguments in logic would account, the intellect is just as prone to making mistakes as the senses. Indeed, the ability of false premises to lead to a true conclusion and form a valid logic statement shows that logic, which is based in pure reason, is fallible in it's own accord. If, within logic, falsity always lead to falsity and truth always led to truth, then this would hint toward a system of infallible intellect, but this is not the case.

Instead we should acknowledge that we are faced with basing understanding on the flawed and imperfect systems (intellect and experience) and can know nothing for certain (since we are working from systems of understanding that are themselves imperfect, everything is open to questioning). With this starting point we can then work toward an approach to truth in which we work not toward absolute conclusions but conclusions of likelihood.

Stephen Hawking and Democritus

We view men like Stephen Hawking are the future, as pioneers for our world. Men like Hawking are ever pressing the bounds of science by using Inductive reasoning to work through problems that we simply cannot know at our current level of technology. In this weeks reading we're faced with a Stephen Hawking about 2400 years early, Democritus.

Democritus is trying to figure out the world and starts talking about this crazy idea called Atomism. Democritus believes that the world is comprised of an infinite number of atoms that comprise everything from the visible, like bodies, to the invisible, like souls. If this, idea that everything is comprised of "innumerable elements in perpetual motion" which cannot be combined nor further divided, is your starting point then you're are faced with the question of how the larger parts are made. Now we, with our modern science and high power telescopes, understand electrons and attractions and how these form molecules, but with no such equipment Democritus derives a rather workable notion that the atoms are comprised differently, being hooked, angled, convex, concave, thus allowing them to connect together physically and be broken apart if "some stronger necessity comes...and scatters them apart."

Again, looking back this idea seems rather ludicrous, we know atoms (and their smaller parts) are attracted to each other because of innate charges. We have discovered this through the scientific process, gaining empirical evidence to support our created theories. Democritus didn't have the resources available to follow the scientific process and instead he relied on inductive reasoning to come up with a nearly workable system to explain the questions raised in his world.

Today we can look back on Democritus inductive reasoning and wonder how our own thinkers will look in two millennia.